


Come to the Seashore/ I Will Seek Other Shores

by Calyps0



Category: The Blacklist (US TV)
Genre: Angst, Drabble, F/M, Lizzington - Freeform, Narrative, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-18 11:31:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18248969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calyps0/pseuds/Calyps0
Summary: Short little piece about Red and Lizzie's journey.





	Come to the Seashore/ I Will Seek Other Shores

She thinks about him, sometimes. But not the mask. Not the act. Just the simple truths that dance in the air, uncatchable, slipping between her fingers, scenting the air like mourning, bruised flowers.

The glimpses of him that are real, the pieces that he has shown, that have managed to slip through the cracks—

A moment.

A gesture.

A sigh.

These are the things that she treasures: these are the things that aren’t false.

It’s hard to remember these things, sometimes. Hard when he’s bearing down like a stormy tempest and the world is laying at his feet. Hard when the arch of a kill is still gleaming wildly in his eyes, blood staining his hands, violent and capable. Hard when he is desperate and ravaged and raw, and she lets his wounds fester, too hurt herself to take away his pain.

But she does remember, even though it is hard. She tucks these things, with the others, close to her heart:

The star he had once shown her, when the world was water and light.

A music box, a cuckoo clock, a piano piece—and the gentle hands that had fixed them.

He is a fisherman, a carpenter, but he is far, far from devout.

\---

The moment he first sees her, eyes of sea, he knows he will drown.

He will fall beyond the surface, watching her feet dance lightly atop the waters while his lungs fill with liquid. He blinks the image out of his eyes and glances down at the toddler with awe written on his face.

She is hiding behind her mother, small fingers gripping the fabric of her jeans like a lifeline, and he can’t help but stare in wonder.

She’s nothing like her mother in looks, really—tall willowy Katerina stands like a delicate rose, hair fiery red and features marble and fine.

But this girl, this _Masha_ , looks like her father: dark, dark locks curling up at the ends, and something about her— he thinks it must be her eyes again, and those thick, sooty, lashes—is almost unearthly.

_“Elizabeth,”_ he tells her mother, _“I’ll call her Elizabeth.”_

_Darling little Lizzie_ , he thinks to himself.

Like a queen.

\---

He wonders where the resemblance lies, then.

She is no red haired child, but if she inherits her mother’s temper, he will be in trouble.

Thirty years later, and he gets his answer.

\---

The decades have been long, and that peace he had realized when he laid eyes upon her he has not known since. But it is time, as he always knew it would be. He goes to her, and when he sees her again, after all this time, and the woman is a stranger but her eyes are not, her name on his lips sounds like a prayer.

She just might be his salvation.

\---

She doesn’t recognize him.

He hadn’t expected her to, but it stings nonetheless. No flicker of anything flashes in those ocean eyes except wariness, and maybe just a hint of self-assurance.

But he tells her just enough, teases her with what is to come, and she _catches._ He’s got her hooked, and he will never let her go.

\---

She proves to him soon enough that she is not a thing to be hunted. She is no prey that is easily swayed with pretty promises and poetic words.

There is a pen in his neck, and a laugh almost bubbles out of him before he catches it. He might need to reevaluate this. Reevaluate _her_.

\---

She alternates between yelling at him and holding his hand, screaming and crying and then letting him kiss her hair.

He gets dizzy, sometimes, with the force of her anger, or her surrender.

Soft, then hard, then soft again.

He realizes with a jolt, soon, what this is.

  
_I’m falling, he thinks._

And then—

_This was not in my plan._

\---

She kissed his cheek in a museum once, and she doesn’t know it, but this is one of the memories he holds close to his heart, something he thinks of when the world is flying apart at the seams.

\---

She is bewitching, ensnaring. She could choke the air from his lungs, breath by breath, and he would let her, if only for the chance to make her smile. Revel in the malice in her eyes as his world turned to dark and fire.

What he would give, now, for that to be true.

_I was the one,_ he thinks, when he kisses her brow—still warm, in the back of an ambulance—so cold.

_I was the one who knew you would be great._

_\---_

He sails on a high that feels like it will be his last. _It wouldn’t be so bad,_ he thinks, _to go like this. But something surely is missing. I must be forgetting something._

He wakes and he feels like his chest is open, his heart exposed to the cool air, so great is the pain that knifes there.

He had been sworn to protect her.

He has failed.

\---

He sees her blink through the pane of a darkened windshield and feels betrayal slicing through his innards even as sweet relief pours like rain from the heavens upon him.

_It’s easy to forgive,_ he realizes.

_But it is hard to forget._

\---

_Tell me it’s worth it,_ she screams at him once in memory, _you keeping my secrets trussed up in a music box and a tight ribbon-bow. Tell me it’s for my own good. But look me in the eyes when you do, so I know it’s the truth._

He had been certain once.

He’s not so certain anymore.

\---

He feels as if he’s treading underwater. His head hurts.

His heart hurts, too, but it always hurts now.

\---

It gets tiring, this dance. His feet are sore, his arms ache. He is near delirious with exhaustion, and still they spin ‘round and ‘round, dancing and sliding, leaping and gliding, slow and fast, dodge then parry.

Who knew love would be so painful?

Who knew he would always choose this pain?

\---

She wants numb, blessed relief. She is sitting on the bones of her husband, on the death of her marriage, on her failures and her triumphs and her tired, worn-out dreams.

_I am tired of this dance._

He swims around her, now, this fisherman, this carpenter.

This man who is far, far from devout.

_I’m falling,_ she thinks, and then—

_This was not in my plan._

**Author's Note:**

> I have a habit of using church hymns as titles. Sorry. Maybe next time I'll come up with something original, but this seemed apropos!
> 
> Thanks for reading, and if you want, let me know what you think!


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